tops

Tour Operators System

A fully integrated travel reservations system with advanced accounting and management features – especially developed for tour operators and travel wholesalers.

User Friendly

With our intuitive user interface, there is no need for extensive training your employees or customers.

Cloud Based

With our cloud-based system you don't need infrastructure or IT professionals.
Our system grows as your business grows. You can start small and grow. You can start big....

Ready Database

We take care of maintaining and updating a hotel database of +80,000 properties for you on an ongoing basis

TOPS provides a professional and all-encompassing solution for both incoming and outgoing tourism including F.I.T., organized tours, Dynamic packages, other land arrangements and flights.
The system integrates fully with CAV Systems' Bookkeeping and Financial Management System, on-line and without interfaces.
The system provides user-friendly tools for building “products”, packages and deals; costing tools and profit analysis.
TOPS is implemented using web-based technology and a JAVA based user interface, which is both simple to use and flexible.
Customizable parameters allow for maximum adaptation of the system to the specific processes and needs of the company.

As a cloud-based system, getting started with TOPS is simple and straightforward since it does not entail installing any software at the user station. A standard browser is all that is needed – and the same is true for ongoing maintenance. We take care of everything behind the scenes.

Control

TOPS System Modules

F.I.T

The F.I.T. module manages reservations for a range of services for outgoing, incoming, and internal tourism. Dynamic packages are user-defined. Included in the module are all back-office operations.

The system also includes functions for managing Internet sites:

B2B for Agencies

B2C for Retail Customers

White Label Sites

The F.I.T module includes support for automatic communications between suppliers, agencies and the back-office system. All stages of the sales process are supported, from the initial reservation through the accounting process and the profit/loss analysis.

Infrastructure

The database includes multiple user-defined tables for managing all aspects of the reservation process. Selected tables can be updated via xml interfaces with suppliers.

XML Suppliers:

Database includes supplier definitions as well as cross-tables (translating between supplier and internal codes). Dynamic update of database via background communications between database and supplier.

Local Suppliers:

Database includes supplier data as well as prices and policies (cancellations, etc.)

If reservation status is OK, notification is automatically sent to the customer

If reservation status returns as “request”, an automatic scheduler continues to check with the supplier for a change of status. If the reservation status does change, the system automatically updates the new status. If the status is now OK, notification is automatically sent to the customer. If the status returned is SO (sold out), notification is not sent automatically, allowing the back office to handle the reservation.

Local Suppliers workflow:

Suppliers price list input to system

Reservations sent to supplier in accordance with supplier definitions: email, html, URL or fax. (html & URL options include automatic update of status upon receipt of OK from supplier)

On change of reservation status to OK notification is sent automatically to the customer

On change of status to SO (sold out), notification is not sent automatically, allowing the back office to handle the reservation.

Modular definition utility allows unlimited combinations of flights, hotels and other services. Supports functions for automatic calculation of gross price per service, based on algorithm from net price.

Flexible packages allow customer selection of hotel and or car rental from a pre-defined list.

Package Reservation

User-friendly query allows simple selection of package from range of packages available for selected dates and destinations.

Package reservation includes automatic notification to both suppliers and customers, documentation, billing and account tracking with supplier and customer.

Reservation Utilities:

Search for reservation by customer, status, destination, dates with entry to individual docket for update.

Manage reservations queues by status – for example, all dockets with status “sold out” or “request”.

Notification utility for sending messages to suppliers or customers for a selected group of reservations.

B2B Website for Agencies

Advanced search utility consolidating and normalizing data from multiple suppliers to single customer presentation, filtered through system defined business logic. (For example, hotel reservation utility will display single price list and availability culled from duplicate results as received from on-line search to multiple suppliers.)

Create deals and specials. Define which users will have deals presented on site (per agency, chain, agent, etc.) Create and control “Daily News” feature on site. Control display of specials per location or dates and include external files to be displayed on website.

Additional Modules

TOPS includes additional optional modules such as Organized Tour Groups. Contact us for more information.

CAV’s tourism division; responsible for development, support and implementation of TOPS, has years of experience in all aspects of tourism and includes accountants, software engineers, technology experts and project managers.

Single-vendor, integrated solution including: software, technological infrastructure, methodology, service and support. Significant savings in integration between systems. Significant savings in time required for implementation. Greater convenience in system support and maintenance.

Full integration with CAV Systems’ bookkeeping and financial management software guarantees integrity and controls between operations and financial management.

Web-based Technology in both front-end and back-end systems. Access system via Internet browser. No installation required.

User-friendly, intuitive and flexible, Java-based user interface.

Technology Overview

Back Office Technology

Web Technology

Database

User Interface

Technology Overview

TOPS is a well-established software package; designed, developed and maintained by CAV Systems. TOPS is the choice of software for Israel’s leading tourism companies.CAV Systems has over ten years experience in Java technology and open-source infrastructure, including Linux, Apache Tomcat, J2EE Server and Java/J2EE interfaces. e-TOPS is based on an embedded database, customized for large volume of transactions, maximum performance and scalability.

The system architecture is three-tiered. Tiers can be combined as required. Each tier can run on distributed servers, for additional reliability as well as load balancing. While the system can be run under numerous operating systems including Linux, Windows and Unix; we recommend Linux (Suse ES 10/11 or Red Hat EL 5 ) for its stability and built-in security features. All elements can be run using virtual systems. Many of our customers currently use VMWare, including cluster.

Back Office Technology

Back office users access the system via Java, hence, no desktop installation is required (can be Linux or Mac stations). Software updates are deployed only to the server and loaded transparently to user stations.

Back office applications are developed using our in-house application generator, designed for speed and flexibility of development. End user tools include our report generator and download to Excel as well as creation of user-customized PDF reports.

The application server can be merged with the database server, or maintained separately for survivability and load balancing. If the servers are separate, a caching utility is used for greater performance.

Web Technology

CAV Systems was the first Israeli software company to offer a fully web-based solution in the tourism industry. Our applications utilize Java Server Pages (JSP) as well as open-source infrastructure and libraries. Apache Tomcat is our J2EE Application Server, with all the advantages this entails: reliability, security, load balancing, failover, supplementary tools and interfaces and comfortable licensing. Apache Tomcat can also interface with SSL Accelerators, has configurable load balancing features and connectivity with Apache HTTPD. Load balancing can be implemented via session stickiness or session distribution for greater resilience.

Database

TOPS uses an embedded database, which is object oriented and designed for a high volume of transactions. At the same time, it is both flexible and scalable and has minimal hardware requirements. No DBA is required. The system supports advanced features required for critical applications such as high availability, clustering, online replication, hot backups, etc. As a result of these features it is the database for many applications in medicine and finance such as the Veteran’s Administration in the United States and one of the largest Brokerage houses in the world – Ameritrade.

The database supports:

Active-passive clustering for High availability which is both simple and inexpensive. Uses shared storage for clustered servers.

Active-active clustering on Redhat Cluster: total hardware separation and complete High availability.

Online Replication for disaster recovery. Online copy of database on remote server, with minimal network requirements based on data compression

User Interface

TOPS user interface is JAVA based and can be accessed via any web browser. Multiple sessions can be opened. The tree-structured menu can be customized for individual user “favorites” and includes a quick-search utility.